As you might have heard, a little company named Google decided to launch their own dream machine, or superphone as they like to call it, on January 5th. This Android 2.1 OS smartphone has quite lovely high end specs and is only sold direct by Google, not through carriers. The Nexus One is now available in a GSM world phone version with 3G for T-Mobile in the US and overseas. That means it will only run on EDGE for data on AT&T. There will be a version for Verizon's network this spring. The phone is made by HTC.

The Nexus One is sold unlocked, though you can get it with a steep discount if you sign up for a T-Mobile contract. It's $529 with no contract and $179 with contract. At $179, the phone is a bargain given the specs. So far, it looks like the only way you'll be able to get it is via Google's new phone store (www.google.com/phone) and not from the carrier.

The Nexus One has a 3.7" capacitive AMOLED display that's bright and rich. The display's reds and yellows aren't as blown out as we've seen on some Samsung AMOLED displays-- we like. The resolution is 480 x 800 and it has an accelerometer and proximity sensor.

The CPU is Qualcomm's venerable 1GHz Snapdragon, and this thing moves. It has 512 megs of RAM (that's a lot compared to previous Android phones) and 512 megs flash storage. It has an SDHC microSD card slot and a 4 gig card is included.

Google includes a charger, micro USB cable, stereo headset and a slip case in the box. The phone is available now if you're in the US and Google is currently providing free overnight FedEx delivery.

Here's part one of our video review. We do an unboxing, show the included accessories, take a walk around the phone and compare it with an army of competing smartphones including the Nokia N900, HTC Magic / MyTouch 3G, Motorola Droid, iPhone and the HTC HD2.

We'll have part two of our video review tomorrow and that will cover the Nexus One's features in action (web browser, Google Maps, YouTube, new features for Android 2.1 and more).